EARLY 2024 was rife with speculation on the future of the Xbox, especially when several exclusive titles on the console jumped to the PlayStation 5. While Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer gave assurances that the production of Xbox consoles would not be discontinued, he never fully explained the decision to take the exclusives into a multiplatform route.
Now, there may be a possible clear answer with the tech giant’s third-quarterly earnings. The Xbox Series X/S consoles are suffering from lesser and lesser purchases, or more specifically, revenue is down by 30% year-over-year.
Ironically, Microsoft attributed the plummet being due to “lower volume of consoles sold” at the start of 2024, which was the same reason given last year. “Xbox hardware revenue decreased 30% on a strong prior year comparable, driven by lower volume of consoles sold,” Microsoft said in April last year.
At the start of the year, Take-Two Interactive Software Inc told investors that there were 77 million “Generation 9” consoles in people’s homes, which led people to speculate that Microsoft had sold 25 million units of Xbox Series X/S.
Though things may seem grim in terms of units sold, Microsoft is not abandoning the console, and even promised the next iteration will be the “biggest technical leap” in its hardware history. The Xbox arm of the company is also committed to improving what it is being offered, particularly with the Game Pass subscription service and game preservation.
